[laymanspc]

TP2 is my first smartphone, I came from a basic plain jane Moto Razr V3M. I have friends with both iphones and android based phones, they're young and wanna be cool. The one person I know with a Windows phone has an original touch pro and could care less about anything beyond the stock offerings. I read everything I could and learned all I could about all the devices with actually owning each. What I learned was that I was waiting for my provider to release their WinMo6.5 TP2...

With very little effort (some reading, reg edits, and cab installs...) I've been able to do things without a ROM flash that are totally impossible without a "jailbroke" or "rooted" alternative.

I can't see it requiring a seasoned expert to be an informed shopper and do some reading when investing a couple hundred bucks on something you'll have throughout a contract that you could have thousands in by the contract's end. There are toys, and then there are tools. Anyone with some research can see that Microsoft has everything it needs to have a strong foothold in the field for many years to come. With implementations such as the ones from HTC, and the possibilities shown by ROM chefs and app developers, it's easy to see WinMo has a bright future. Apple is too concerned with keeping things on their terms, if anyone throws a fit over mods/flashing/jailbreaking/rooting a phone, it will end up being apple. Android has a chance to byte a chunk of marketshare if they're not sidetracked by the 50,000 different projects they (Google) are involved in. Blackberry is losing footing as their server software is sold at a a downright silly price and their devices are mostly impossible to dial a number with their tiny scrunched up qwerty dial pad (kicka** phone there), whereas MS has shown the commitment and continual improvement needed for the long term outlook as well as a proven standard for their app development. Something that can only be said of iphone or android after they have quite a bit more age with a few more generations of their respective OSs and hardware. You want to be able to change devices over time and keep the software familiar and easy. That hasn't yet shown to be the case with the alternatives. Until they pass some milestones, that's all they are, alternatives...